


Lift

by sadsparties



Category: Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Aircraft, Balloons, Gen, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-24
Updated: 2013-07-24
Packaged: 2017-12-21 05:25:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/896321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sadsparties/pseuds/sadsparties
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Combeferre pursues a childhood dream, and Enjolras witnesses something beautiful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lift

Auvergne was never known for its warm weather. The mountain air was thin and cold and harsh, and the steep trails were not remembered to be particularly conducive to travelers. Without a guide, a lonely adventurer could easily lose himself in the maze of foliage, and while the trees cannot harm him, a slip of the foot in the wrong point could mean his end. It was precisely in this spot that Combeferre bent over with hands on his knees as he attempted to breathe properly. Sweat trickled from the tips of his hair, but he absently wiped them off with the back of his hand. “Shall we rest?" Enjolras coaxed him, as he had for the past hour. Combeferre shook his head vehemently, as he had for the same amount of time. “As much as I need to, I cannot," he said in a voice that invited no contest. Combeferre straightened up, took hold of his walking stick and plunged it to the ground as he stepped forward resolutely. His companion stood befuddled and followed soon after.

At one point in this adventure, Enjolras had yet to fully grasp what possessed Combeferre to be so adamant in the journey. Enjolras had been lounging in their rooms, reading a letter with disturbing news from Lyons. There was freshly-brewed tea on the tabletop, but Enjolras had hardly touched the refreshment when the cup toppled aside with the violent opening of the door. Combeferre had pushed the pathetic piece of board with a force, rushed to his drawers, filled an old sack, and announced that he was going to Auvergne. He was breathless, restless and to all appearances, out of his mind. A lesser man would have been stupefied into silence, but Enjolras could have hardly let him journey alone in that heightened state. In the few seconds that Combeferre required to settle his personal effects, Enjolras had come to the end of his reflection and said, “Shall I accompany you?"

In the two-day coach ride to Auvergne, Combeferre had found it in himself to enter again that perpetual state of peace he seemed to wallow in and explain. “I saw it in today’s canards," he narrated. “It is not my usual taste to listen to those theatrics, but when flying globes were mentioned, I simply could not pass idly. The paper reports that in the interest of measuring air temperature and moisture, two men of science in the names of Lussac and Biot are conducting short balloon voyages to collect air samples from different heights. They will only be on air for a while at a time, but it was mentioned that they will pass through Usson. The volcanic aerosphere there is sure to be fascinating."

Enjolras listened to this litany of facts and figures with great attention. He did not grasp half of it at times, but he was genuinely glad to engage Combeferre in his interests. Combeferre had a habit of gesticulating wildly when explaining something that Enjolras had never seen before. He traced the sides of the aircraft with his palms. He opened and closed his hands in an attempt to portray the sack filling with air. He frowned when he thought that his given explanation was not satisfactory, and wrestled his mind to find a different approach.

And so they found themselves in a mountain trail in Usson, the exact location of which cannot be recalled, with Combeferre desperately gasping for air and both of them shivering from the cold. In their haste, they did not think to bring thick clothes, but the rigidity of the exercise had kept them somewhat warm.

"Do you think," Combeferre asked as he eased the stitch on his side, “that they will worry about us?"

Enjolras considered this for a moment. “I am sure that Courfeyrac will receive our post in the morning."

"Of course. Our letter…" Combeferre mused aloud, as if he had momentarily forgotten how they scavenged for paper and pen at the station. Such was his focus of mind at the task at hand that he relegated all other concerns to the side.

"Are you certain that they will pass this way?" Enjolras gestured to the view from their trail. Combeferre’s shoulders visibly slumped.  “One cannot completely trust sensational news," he said, “but suppose that they will, we cannot be sure that it will be in view of this vantage point."

Enjolras sensed the building disappointment in his friend and silently hoped that Providence will stir the winds and let a floating basket come their way. While he was scanning the horizon, Combeferre opened his sack and took out a battered, old book with the spine falling apart. When Enjolras inquired what it was, an unsuppressed grin appeared on his face. “It is George Cayley’s _On Aerial Navigation_ ," he said in a tone full of fondness. “I have had it since I was a boy."

How could one react to such charming honesty? Combeferre’s sheepish expression was a mix of embarrassment and expectation, and Enjolras could not help but form a smile. He resigned himself to a sigh of profound tenderness, a reaction that none could have provoked but Combeferre.

Suddenly, Combeferre’s hold on the book tightened, and his face transformed into that which he wore the moment he burst into their rooms proclaiming about unexpected trips. He rushed past Enjolras towards a formation of rocks that formed near the edge of a cliff. Still clutching the book to his chest, he clambered up as high as he could and gazed out into the sky.

Just over a cluster of trees, in the direction of where Saint Etienne would be, a tiny blob hovered in the distance, its blue envelope of taffeta indistinguishable from the clear sky had it not been for its gold flourishes. The splotches of colour were hard to recognize, but Combeferre knew what they were. His eyes widened in wonder and awe, and for a while looked like that of a boy pressed against a shop window. The shop displayed postcards depicting the balloon public demonstrations, and Combeferre remembered every detail — gold suns and star signs against blue, fleur-de-lis and eagles in red, the wicker basket barely being restrained by a thin tether. It was the magnificence of man and nature brought together, the harnessing of the purest of substances to produce the power of lift. It was an observation post, a carrier of knowledge to faraway lands, a bridge to the sky that has so long remained a mystery. It was the combination of the solitary, the sublime, and the terrifying.

Tears formed in his eyes, but Combeferre dared not blink to miss the moment. His hand tightened around his book, and the mountain breeze stung his face. Enjolras watched him silently, and for a brief moment, he had seen Combeferre transform into a child. The man before him became a boy, a boy who sat bowed over a book too advanced for him to understand but cherished it all the same, a boy who turned pages upon pages while running his forefinger over every line of illustration, a boy who had slowly grown frustrated over the clumsiness of his own designs on paper.

Enjolras was motionless at the bottom of the boulder. He could not bring himself to interrupt Combeferre’s reverie. It felt intrusive, and yet he did not feel that he was unwelcome. It seemed to him that Combeferre had collapsed and reformed into someone he had not recognized before, but he was fairly sure that what he’d seen had been there all the while.

"The globe," Combeferre recalled, his words demonstrative of the repeated skimming of favorite passages, “the first _globe aérostatique_ was made with a balloon of sackcloth with three layers of paper inside. It was held together by 1,800 buttons and a reinforcing fish net of cord, and flew for 10 minutes while covering 2 kilometers. The flight relies on the buoyancy of the hot air provided by the burner and constrained by the envelope. By increasing the air temperature, the envelope becomes lighter than the surrounding air and is propelled by the same force described in Archimedes’ principle. To create lift by manipulating nature with nature – such is real progress derived from innate forces. "

At the end of this trance-like monologue, the balloon had disappeared behind a cluster of trees. It left no trace in its wake, but Combeferre kept his eyes glued to the point where it had been. The horizon seemed no different than it was before, as if a sublime thing had not occurred, as if a man had not become a child again. Combeferre turned to Enjolras and gazed down at his solemn face. He was not quite sure what had happened exactly, but he was glad that Enjolras had been there with him.

“How was it?” Combeferre asked. Enjolras smiled in turn.

“It was beautiful.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Several historical dates have been altered to fit this timeline. In 1804, Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac and Jean-Baptiste Biot used a hot-air balloon to collect air samples at different heights in order to investigate the Earth’s atmosphere. They are often portrayed riding a brown balloon, but that’s kind of boring, isn’t it? Instead, the Montgolfière design was used. The first Montgolfière-style hot air balloon was publicly demonstrated in Annonay in 1783 and featured a sky blue sackcloth with gold flourishes.


End file.
